1989 Fleer Randy Johnson #381 Marlboro Errors - 30 Years Later

[Statfreak101]

Originally Posted by steve5838

Ben, I believe I own the blue one you had. I bought it from David on this board. I'm pretty sure this is the one due to the small scratch over the Marlboro man. I was lucky enough to grab a second blue one on EBay earlier this year. I know Kevin also has one of the blue ones. Outside of these and the ones on Hatorade's site I haven't seen others (but always on the lookout in case more come out of the woodwork).

I'm still hoping to add to my above sketch but have been holding off for some cards to get back from PSA grading so I can scan them. If possible I want to use the same scanner and same settings so I can better differentiate the versions (as opposed to differences in scanner or photo settings).

Good stuff.

I just pulled my first rack pack with a Johnson variation on top - black box, and it wasn't during the time period that we all though it "should" be.

What is Hatorade's site? Can you provide that? Thanks!

[jp1216]

Originally Posted by Statfreak101

What is Hatorade's site? Can you provide that? Thanks!

Post #5 of this thread

[Hatorade]

Originally Posted by jacksoncoupage

I’ve been closely following the surge in 1989 Fleer case breaking over the last several months and a few things have become very clear RE: the Randy Johnson card:
1. All correction types/methods took place by January 1st. No 1989 dated case has turned out a non-full blacked out version.
2. Several types of corrections will come from the same case. This is very interesting to me as I previously had assumed that since Fleer had used two printing facilities for this product, that was the cause for the color tints.
But now I am convinced that Fleer had multiple presses running (perhaps at both plants) and each press had a different type of correction to the plate; for example: say they had four presses going, one would have a green mask over the sign, one a red box, etc etc. This is the only way I can explain the various versions coming out of specific day dated cases.

This sounds pretty similar to my experience with opening packs. We haven’t opened a ton but I would guess around 40-50 boxes. The cases would contain multiple different versions with maybe a couple cards being the same version or very similar. I think there are some cases though where you will pull multiple cards that are the same. I can recall several times when I’ve purchased cards in lots and every card in the lot was nearly identical. The largest lot I recall purchasing was 7 of the same cards.

Originally Posted by Statfreak101

Good stuff.
I just pulled my first rack pack with a Johnson variation on top - black box, and it wasn't during the time period that we all though it "should" be.

That’s awesome! Would you mind sharing a image of that rack pack? You are the 2nd person to mention getting an error variation past the Jan 1 89 threshold. The other person is an RJ collector that reached out to me on Facebook and mentioned that he pulled an error version of the Johnson from a box that contained the correct Ripken FF card. I have opened lots of wax boxes that contained the common version of the Johnson with the error Ripken but never the other way around but it sounds like maybe a few RJ errors may have snuck into some of the 89 cases.

[steve5838]

Hi everyone. Sorry it has taken so long. Over the last couple months I’ve spent quite a bit of time trying to wrap my mind around the “best” way to extend my classification figure of the Randy Johnson Marlboro cards. I have over 70 of the 1989 Fleer Randy Johnson cards which I believe PSA could label as "Marlboro Ad on Scoreboard" (over 40 of these are graded by PSA or BGS). Of course there is a wide range of versions which could fall under this label. I want to preface this by saying that this was my attempt at classifying the different versions under this heading. That said, I am sure not everyone will agree with what I've put together and am equally sure that there could be better ways of doing this. Also, I am limited due to the size and scope of my collection (I have not actively collected the blackbox or fish versions). Just because I don’t show a particular version only means that I don’t have that version (not that it doesn’t exist). That said, for me, the resulting classification provides some order to help me better understand (and gives me a new way to think about) the versions I have in my collection (i.e., cards which PSA could potentially classify as "Marlboro Ad on Scoreboard"). Take it for what it is worth.

Here was my process. I scanned all 70+ of my cards and cropped the Marlboro sign. All scans were made on the same scanner with the same scanner settings. I used an Espon V600 scanner for all scans. Someone on the board posted a good set of instructions on using an Epson V600 scanner so I purchased this scanner last spring at the start of the lockdowns (to avoid any learning curve). I am very happy with it because I can get consistent lighting conditions on the Marlboro signs across the various versions. I then put all the cropped scans of the Marlboro sign into a PowerPoint slide and manually moved the 70+ photos around to try and put "like cards" in piles. I then arranged the piles into some natural order (at least to me) based on (1) tint, and (2) clarity - defined as being able to clearly read all letters in the word Marlboro. Of course, this definition of "clarity" impacts the order since there are versions with very clear letters but where you can't see the cowboy. The definition for tint was harder than it first appeared and it took me quite a bit of trial and error to come up with what I believe is a logical scale…

As I put “Marlboro signs” into piles the one thing that began to stand out to me was subtle differences in cards with the same clarity due to "vibrancy". Upon closer inspection I began to attribute this "vibrancy" to having more blue-ness or almost a blue glow around the sign. I had always assumed that "clarity" was on a continuous scale. Now, I feel that tint is on a continuous scale too. I became curious about what would happen if there were three PRIMARY COLORS of tint (i.e., GREEN, BLUE, and RED -- labeled g1, b1, and r1 in the figure). I know these are not the real primary colors but they seem to be predominant varieties of the tints so I went with them. For example, on the blue-red spectrum you get purple tint cards, on the green-blue spectrum you get the very dark GREEN, and on the green-red spectrum you get some of the more dulled out reds.

Anyway, I ran with this idea (because under this notion the card locations started to naturally fall into place) and here is what I came up with. I threw in some labels for my own record keeping (but did not label anything that I felt couldn’t be classified as “Marlboro Ad on Scoreboard”… of course you may disagree). A couple of final notes. Beyond the clearest version (n0), my favorite versions are b1 and br2. I never really understood what made br2 stand out to me over the similarly clear rg2 card. Now I believe it is due to the blue-ish tint that makes the letters almost vibrant in the br2 version. Some people may scoff at this but holding br2 and rg2 next to each other there is a clear difference and I know which version resonates with me (perhaps since my favorite color is blue??). Second, I put a yellow rectangle around the blue box version that Hatorade provided. This is the one version I do not have a copy of (so the picture is not from the same scanner/scanner settings). Beyond that one card these are all my cards and I was able to group every one of my 70+ cards into one of the piles shown in the figure. Third, I want to reiterate that my view of “clarity” is on a continuous scale. There could certainly be versions between g1 and gb2; however, for me simply knowing I have a card that is g1-gb2 is sufficient to know where it places in my mental framework of the versions.

I hope this helps move forward the discussion and interest in my favorite card.

Steve

[jp1216]

That's really a great layout. Thanks!

[Statfreak101]

Steve, thank you for that post. It is a pretty freaking sweet thing to read, given I am an avid 1989 Fleer collector (mainly for Johnson & Ripken).

Thanks for all your work in providing that. I would love to chat more with you at some point, if possible.

[Hatorade]

That chart is great Steve. It provides a great comparison/contrast of some of the different lightly tinted versions. It’s a really nice showcase of the differences in similar cards with the way they are all grouped. There are a couple of interesting ways to further develop the relationship that exists between the cards by looking at other areas of the card outside of the ad while comparing the ad areas. Recurring print dots and the red squiggle are a couple of features that have correlations to certain versions. An example of this, if I see them correctly, would be that it is very likely if you shared larger images of rg2 and gr2, both of them will have the red squiggles and either or both of them will have a 4 dot. The 4 dot is in the diagonal blue line next to Randy’s head in the image below. With your collection of cards you likely have 4 or 5 other cards with the 4 dot on them as well.

[steve5838]

Originally Posted by Hatorade

That chart is great Steve. It provides a great comparison/contrast of some of the different lightly tinted versions. It’s a really nice showcase of the differences in similar cards with the way they are all grouped. There are a couple of interesting ways to further develop the relationship that exists between the cards by looking at other areas of the card outside of the ad while comparing the ad areas. Recurring print dots and the red squiggle are a couple of features that have correlations to certain versions. An example of this, if I see them correctly, would be that it is very likely if you shared larger images of rg2 and gr2, both of them will have the red squiggles and either or both of them will have a 4 dot. The 4 dot is in the diagonal blue line next to Randy’s head in the image below. With your collection of cards you likely have 4 or 5 other cards with the 4 dot on them as well.

Thanks, everyone. It was fun putting this together.

Hatorade, that is a beautiful card. I believe that is what I labeled br2 in my figure. You have a great point about the dot in the blue bar. I just checked and I have a br2 one just like yours where the dot is in this lower vertical position. I also have br2s without any dot and some br2s with the dot in the same place horizontally but in a higher vertical position. I believe all of my rg2s and most of my gr2s also have a dot (I don't think I have any cards of the rg2 version without a dot - but of course that doesn't mean they aren't out there). I haven't seen this dot on versions n0, b1, r1, g1, gb2, rb2, br3, or br4. I don't think the dot is common on rg3 either but am not 100% sure it doesn't exist. This dot has actually been a big help to me in purchasing cards on eBay when it isn't otherwise apparent from picture quality in the listing which version you are getting. When I see a card with this dot on a relatively lighted tinted card I'm pretty sure it will be something that PSA would label "Marlboro Ad on Scoreboard".

Extrapolating from the figure, I'm really hoping there might exist a very light green (maybe even almost yellowish) tint card with no bubble and the cowboy visible. I've never seen one of these but it seems one could exist (as a more pure g1 variant).